Soweto, Under the Apricot Tree

by Niq Mhlongo

  “I agree there are things that need cultural reform.”

  “All of this is cultural hypocrisy. Look over there – roses on the grave. What’s that? A person may never receive roses in their entire life but they will surely get lots of them dumped on their graves during their funeral. I really don’t think the old man ever received roses while alive. Had you ever been to his house before he died?”

  “No, but –”

  “Neither had I, until the day of the night vigil. It was my first time seeing the inside of his house. Is that not hypocrisy? And I don’t think the dead man attended church either. But this funeral procession started from the church, knowing full well that the old man had nothing to do with worship while alive. His kitchen never even had a granite top, but look at the stone that they are going to put on his grave. I’m just tired of this cultural hypocrisy, ntwana.”

  It was during the last item on the programme that two great gusts of wind suddenly came up and then died away, as if by magic. The dust had just settled again when I saw a white tow truck pass by slowly and stop next to Bra Makhenzo’s car. His teeth flashed in a forced smile as if he knew something was about to happen to him. My gaze remained magnetised by the tow truck. I saw four people get out – three white guys and a black guy. They were all muscled and looked like professional rugby players. Bra Ma­khenzo ran towards them quickly. He started talking to one of the white guys, who had serious eyes and thick dark-grey eyebrows. The other three tough guys surrounded him. He looked nervous. The raised voices aroused the inquisitive ears of the mourners. As Makhenzo stepped closer, he growled, his irritation flaring.

  “That’s my car? You have no right.”

  “It was your car, but it’s no longer yours, buddy. Please hand over the keys,” said the white guy, holding his hand above his eyes to shield them from the sun. “You’ve not been paying your instalments for seven months now.”

  “But I arranged with the bank.”

  “The bank sent us to repossess it.”

  “You guys don’t have respect,” he said. His right hand was swinging beside him. “Why come to the cemetery when I’m bury­ing a relative?”

  “It doesn’t matter. It’s your relative and not ours.”

  “You’re a racist,” he said, visibly restraining his anger with great difficulty.

  “Now you’re speaking dangerous words.” The white guy threatened Bra Makhenzo with a finger. “Watch out, hey. If you want a fight, I’ll give you one.”

  “Give us the keys,” said one of the other guys.

  There was a scuffle as Bra Makhenzo refused to hand over the car keys. Each of the repo guys was armed. When one of them started to take his gun out of its holster, Bra Makhenzo seemed to change his mind. He leaned against the car and clenched his teeth as if fighting a dizzy spell.

  “Let’s go to my home so that I can remove my things and give you the car.”

  “No, you’ve been dodging us for the last three months now,” said the man with the bushy eyebrows, shaking his head. “You’ll have to fetch your goods at the storage. Call your bank and they will tell you where the car is.”

  Makhenzo shrugged his shoulders. The mourners were now leaving the graveside to go to their respective cars and buses. Makhenzo’s car was lifted onto the tow truck and carried away. He looked on, his bulging eyes resembling those of a large, dead fish. The tow truck roared away, churning up dust as it joined the tarred road.

  “I’m going straight to the court. I’m going to sue them and the bank,” Makhenzo said.

  Phumezo put her arm around his shoulders. “Don’t worry, my love. Their victory today is the other side of their defeat. They think they have won. They should think again.”

  “I’ll catch up with you guys later.” He tried to smile at her. “Let me go to the court now. I’ll get a friend to drive me there.”

  Shamefaced, Makhenzo slunk away and walked through the gravestones towards the SACP members who were still praising Slovo. Phumeza, KK, the old man and I walked towards an idling bus. Inside the overcrowded bus, I thought about the perfect timing of the repo. They had chosen to do it at the cemetery during the SACP gig because they knew the police would protect them should there be interference from the mob. A group of people at the back of the bus burst out laughing uproariously. It was as if they were laughing at Makhenzo.

  NAILED

  The MEC had been on the phone with her for almost twenty minutes now. In the rear-view mirror, Mzamo looked at his passenger, who had the latest smartphone glued to his ear, checked the clock on the dashboard and sighed. It didn’t matter that they were heading to her house in Alberton. Unlimited airtime was one of the greatest benefits of being a Member of the Executive Council in the Mpumalanga provincial government. Mr Mgobhozi was nodding vigorously and smiling while staring out the window of the Mercedes. At an intersection, Mzamo indicated and turned. Sitting next to him was the MEC’s bodyguard, Vuyani, whose eyes looked red and swollen.

  “Is our country still in safe hands?” MEC Mgobhozi asked on the phone.

  Mzamo secretly twisted his mouth in irritation and ground his teeth. He and Vuyani had cracked the MEC’s code language some two years ago. Every time their boss started to talk like that, they knew it was going to be a late night. It meant that the husband of the lady in question was not at home.

  “When is the president coming back to the country?” asked MEC Mgobhozi.

  Next to Mzamo, Vuyani stifled a yawn. It was already eleven in the evening. Mzamo had to pretend that everything was fine, but inside he was fuming. He could have accepted the fact that the MEC had denied him compassionate leave to go and bury his sister’s husband in Kanyamazane, near Nelspruit, if there had been a really good reason. But now they were on this sordid mission. Mzamo’s sister, Nelisiwe, had been very upset. But even her phone call to the MEC had made no difference. She had told him that he was arrogant. Mr Mgobhozi told her that his daughter had given birth three days ago at the Brenthurst Clinic in Johannesburg, and that was why he couldn’t let Mzamo attend the funeral. Mzamo had to drive him to the clinic so that he could name his first grandson. Nelisiwe had dropped the call.

  “I’m just thirty minutes away,” confirmed MEC Mgobhozi after looking at the clock on the dashboard. “Are you sure I must not buy a pizza?” He paused and listened. “How can I forget that. Of course I’ve got your favourite Graham Beck Bliss Demi Sec.”

  The MEC laughed on the phone. Mzamo had been the one sent to buy the champagne the previous day. Indeed, he thought, a successful man does not control his fate. The beautiful women around him do.

  Mzamo took another look in the rear-view mirror. The MEC was a little man with a round face and greying hair. His big nose was anchored by flared nostrils that were blocked with black hair. His lips were wide.

  “Really, is that so?” said Mr Mgobhozi on the phone. “I can’t wait.”

  The MEC did not seem to be in a hurry to get to his daughter at all. Were they ever really going to go to the clinic? There was a series of questions that were unanswered in Mzamo’s mind. Why had the MEC denied him his two days’ compassionate leave? Was it just because of a woman? The reason that he wanted to go and name his grandson was not enough – he could have done that over the phone. It was probably bullshit, anyway. The MEC, as an African man, knew the importance of attending a funeral of a relative. Instead, he told Mzamo to drive him from his home in Witbank to Johannesburg. But the worst came when the MEC asked to be driven via Alberton, where he said he needed to see someone. Both Mzamo and Vuyani knew the identity of that some­one. She was his girlfriend Manto. Every time the MEC visited her, he ended up spending more than three hours in her house and this upset Mzamo even more.

  It was around eleven forty-five in the evening when Mzamo parked the car near a solitary jacaranda tree on a deserted street in Alberton. A security patrol car passed them and slowed down near the gated double-storey house. The MEC refreshed himself by splashing BVLGARI perfume on his neck,
chest and wrists. Vuyani went round to open the door for him. From the boot of the car he retrieved some flowers and the bottle of Graham Beck Bliss that Mzamo had bought.

  “I won’t be long,” he said. “You guys must wait here and don’t go anywhere.”

  “We will, comrade,” said Vuyani.

  “You guys must not sleep in the car like you did the last time. You’re not paid to be sleepists inside the car, remember.”

  Mzamo pretended that he didn’t hear the MEC as he inserted a Sankomota CD and immediately selected “Ramasela”. He watched the MEC open the gate and enter the yard of the double-­storey house. They have visited this house on more than ten occasions now. Bastard! Mzamo cursed under his breath as he opened the window. Five years of his life Mzamo has given to the Mpumalanga government, first as a bodyguard and now as the driver for Mr Mgobhozi, the MEC in charge of the provincial Department of Refugees, Tourism, Asylum and Displacements. He was aware of the MEC’s philandering and other secrets. There was a lady called Omuhle, in Nelspruit, who was married with three kids. Mzamo hated it when he was woken in the early hours of the morning by the horny MEC to go and see Omuhle and others. The MEC also made them drive long distances to places like Bloemfontein, Mafikeng or Potchefstroom to collect money from businesspeople who owed him for awarding them tenders. MEC Mgobhozi was doing his master’s in economics with the University of South Africa, but he never had time to study. So he paid ghost writers to complete his assignments for him. Some of the ghost writers were junior employees in his department, and he rewarded a few of them with more senior positions.

  Mr Mgobhozi embraced Manto at the door for a few seconds before she allowed him to step inside. She was wearing her pink nightgown over her pyjama blouse. After the MEC gave Manto the bottle of sparkling wine, he pinched her buttocks playfully as they walked towards the cream-coloured couch. She giggled and responded with a good-humoured pinch on his arm.

  “The country is safe?” he confirmed once again.

  Manto nodded. “Dumi will only be back in the morning.” She had told him that her traffic officer husband carried a gun while on duty, and even though she had said over the phone that he was working night shift, the MEC felt the need to double check.

  “The kids are having a sleepover at their cousins’ house,” Manto continued. “And Ousie Sarah went to her room after she made us something to eat.” The MEC didn’t like Ousie Sarah. He was glad she was out of the way. She always looked at him like he was a fat rat she wanted to chase with a broom. Mgobhozi knew Sis Sarah didn’t like cooking for him. In fact, she had complained to Manto and asked for a raise in her salary from two thousand rand to two and a half thousand rand. The MEC repeatedly told Manto to fire the insolent woman.

  He wiped all thought of Sis Sarah from his mind as Manto put the champagne on the coffee table and flung her arms around his neck.

  They sat on the couch. He stroked her leg with his fingers. Her hands clasped the back of his head, pressing his face into her scented cushiony breasts.

  “Hmmm, baby! Just the way papa loves it.”

  He pulled his head away a little and admired her large breasts, which had pushed out of her blouse. Excitement was rising in him, and making him sweat. He felt a pleasurable thrill start up in the pit of his stomach.

  With his calloused hands, he roughly caressed Manto’s naked thighs. Her hair was parted in the middle and drawn into two plaits that hung down to her shoulders.

  “Let me fetch the glasses for the champagne,” she said as she softly touched him with her long, manicured nails. “Are you hungry?”

  “Not for food yet, but for you, yes.”

  “We will come to that part, darling,” she said as she gave him a gentle scratch with her pink nails. “No need to rush. It’s all yours. The country is safe.”

  With those words, the MEC felt the sweetness of life. The most marvellous of all instants came when her nails gently scraped his neck. He had noticed that her nails seemed newly manicured, and he was almost delirious and gasping with joy at the sight of them. Each finger sported a different type of nail. Her thumbs had creative nails like mountain peaks. On her forefingers, she had what women call the daring, sexy love stiletto nails. The rounded romantic nails were on her middle fingers. Her ring fingers were decorated with assertive and ambitious lipstick-type nails. And her pinkies had bold diva squared nails.

  As MEC Mgobhozi watched Manto walk towards the cupboard by the sink, obscene thoughts crossed his mind. There was something about women with long manicured nails that turned him on. That’s why, when his side-chicks asked him for money to go and do their nails, he didn’t hesitate to give them five thousand rand. The longer the nails, the sexier the woman. He didn’t care even when the nails were fake, unlike some men who think that women with longer nails are lazy. It was a debate he always had with his businessman friend Mlamuli, and they never agreed on this issue. He always dismissed Mlamuli’s assertion that women with long nails cannot take care of their men properly because they are always afraid of breaking their treasured nails. That was a patriarchal thought, the MEC would argue. We African men are a spoiled lot. Why must women wash for us if we can afford a washing machine and a helper, he remembered telling his friend. With those nails, a woman’s touch will give you a thrill like no other. The debate would end up with Mlamuli calling him a pathetic feminist.

  Briefly, the MEC remembered the first day he saw Manto in his office, when she came for an interview. It was not that she was extremely beautiful. Yes, she was pretty, but not more than the average girl you see around Soweto, Kanyamazane or Mamelodi. He had asked her out and given her a job because he was attracted to her long, manicured nails. It didn’t matter that he had been married for more than twenty-eight years and had six children. Anyway, his culture understood that a man cannot have sex exclusively with just one woman for the rest of his life. After all, King Mswati and King Zwelithini both have many wives. According to him, there was nothing wrong with a man being madly in love with his wife and still having other women. What was all the fuss about? Most of the best husbands, like him, have extramarital affairs. It keeps a man abreast of new ways of making his wife happy. There was a great understanding between him and Manto, as they were both happily married. She was not interested in wrecking his marriage, but in strengthening it. She had already seen pictures of his wife and kids on his cellphone and even suggested the name for his newborn nephew – Cabral. He had seen pictures of her children too. Manto and Dumi had two children together, but she had another child from her previous relationship, while Dumi had three from his previous marriage. They have a sexual understanding and partnership that helps them to deal with their individual issues and midlife crises.

  With her nails, Manto knows just how to touch me, he thought. She is always gentle as if she is afraid to break them. Those women with short nails are rough, he thought. Short nails on women were to him a sign of poverty and too much unnecessary domestic work. To him, those are the kind of women who have been indoctrinated to believe that they belong in the kitchen and not the bedroom. They are more likely to bully a man in the relationship, he thought. Such a woman will not think twice before hitting you because she has nothing to lose, as she doesn’t have nails to break.

  Long nails are a sign of peace and great bedroom adventures, and that is why he had never had an argument with Manto through­out their relationship. The bonus is that her beautiful nails always put that much-needed sensation in his middle-aged skin.

  “Now, darling, you do the honour of opening the champagne for us,” she said, and put two glasses in front of him on the coffee table.

  She lay with her head on his thigh after he had poured the champagne. They were alone in the house and masters of their destiny. Manto had told him that the house had started out as an ordinary three-bedroom unit. Her husband had extended it after he and two colleagues had scored one and a half million rand in bribes from a roadblock in the Southgate area, which they shared between
the three of them. The MEC smirked. Smart man . . . but not smart enough.

  Time and again, he grasped her hand and passed it over his loins. With the other hand, he rubbed her toes, the sole of her foot, her ankle. He closed his eyes, and his ears were suddenly blocked. The beauty of the night and the inner feeling of peace filled him with rapture. At that moment, nothing could prevent them from belonging to each other, he believed. Suddenly he was ravenously hungry for her sex, and he tightened his hand under her buttocks. But Manto didn’t want to give in to his desire just yet. The large television set was playing a movie called Tell Me Sweet Something. He tried to say something to Manto, but his tongue got stuck to the roof of his mouth. Instead, he breathed in the pure, clean scent of her body. His passion was rising and getting to the stage now where it was no longer coloured by reason. Simultaneously, they put their empty glasses on the table. Relieved, he watched as she removed her blouse and put it on the coffee table.

  “I want you right now,” he whispered as he kissed her on the right ear. “As in right now.”

  “You will have all of me.”

  Manto helped him take off his shirt and pants, passionately throwing them on the coffee table next to the glasses. He let his hands travel all over her voluptuous body.

  All of a sudden, they heard the front door open. Manto immediately wriggled out of the MEC’s grasp. He tried to sit further away from her, but it was too late. Dumi was already locking the door and putting the key in his pocket. As Dumi approached, the MEC’s legs tried to take flight. Confused, his head whirled and his heart pounded. Manto’s husband was still in his uniform with his gun at his hip. Had someone alerted him? He was also carrying a briefcase in his left hand. More bribe money from a roadblock? A trembling Manto lifted her hand to her face to wipe the sweat off her forehead.